Graybeard maven

He sits there stooped, so stooped that you wonder how he balances himself without falling off . His thick glasses hang precarioulsy over his nose, his eyebrows arched in a twitch, his matted beard, long and curly, his dust covered hair completely disheveled and his face, his face devoid of any vexation and completely absorbed in the task at hand. The walking stick sits still beside his bag like a sacred companion who helps him in his travails. His appearance, well its not something striking, like an old house destined to be demolished . He sports a shirt beneath a brown coat and brown matching pants, the tear and loose stitches indicate eons of rough use. he sits there in a solitary cloud, he doesnt look up to see the passing cars, he doesnt look up to see the hooting vehicles he doesnt look up to see the clear sky, he doesnt look up, he sits there stooped, the sidewalk his consecrated abode.

As we meandered through the traffic one early morning i spot him, i pass a passing glance and continue with the book i was reading. The next day i spot him again. The same posture, his one hand resting on his lap, his legs crossed, sitting sideways on the pavement inches from the moving vehicles. The following day i spot him again, but this time i take notice, held in his other hand is a newspaper, white crumpled and torn on the sides. He sits there hunched, his old baggy eyes fixed in concentration straining to read the newspaper, his wrinkled hands moving up and down the paper, his face contorted, the happenings of the world at his wrinkled fingertips. He must have been a freedom fighter, he must have been a goverment official, he must have been an noetic, he must have been somebody few decades ago, he must have been. I watch him everyday, not with sympathy but with admiration, i watch him but im just another face in the crowd peeping through the window, watching , and then moving on.